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And, O conscript fathers, would that I had been able to be present on the first of August; not that I should have been able to do any good, but to prevent any one saying that not no senator of consular rank (as was the case then) was found worthy of that honour and worthy of the republic. And this circumstance indeed gives me great pain, that men who have enjoyed the most honourable distinctions which the Roman people can confer; did not second Lucius Piso, the proposer of an excellent opinion. Is it for this that the Roman people made us consuls, that, being placed on the loftiest and most honourable step of dignity, we should consider the republic of no importance? Not only did no single man of consular dignity indicate his agreement with Lucius Piso by his voice, but they did not venture even to look as if they agreed with him. What, in the name of all that is horrible, is the meaning of this voluntary slavery?—Some submission may have been unavoidable: nor do I require this from every one of the men who deliver their opinions from the consular bench; the case of those men whose silence I pardon is different from that of those whose expression of their sentiments I require; and I do grieve that those men have fallen under the suspicion of the Roman people, not only as being afraid,—which of itself would be shameful enough,—but as having different private causes for being wanting to their proper dignity.